The wall between the kitchen and Opal's office was thin. Riggs's voice came through it like he was standing in my pocket.
Riggs: Who is she, Opal?
Opal: Her name's Dana. She's on the schedule.
Riggs: Dana who?
Opal: The kind of who that's none of your business.
Riggs: No phone. A car shoved under a tarp. Breaks a pitcher on a man's skull and don't blink.
Riggs: That ain't a waitress, Opal. That's a problem in an apron, and I don't like problems I can't see the shape of.
Opal: She's my hire. You want to dig, dig in your own damn yard.
I stood in the hall with two pots of coffee and my face burning like I'd been slapped.
He'd been adding me up too. Same way I add up a man before I walk past him on a dark street.
Dahlia: You want to know who I am, ask me. I'm standing right here.
Riggs: All right. Who's Dana?
Dahlia: The one who pours your coffee.
Opal: Ha.
Riggs: Uh huh.
He didn't look away. That was the thing about him. He never looked away first.
The pitcher story beat me to the bar.
Somebody said I looked like a woman who got rode hard and put up wet, and the whole room laughed like it was the funniest thing since payday.
Greta: Keep it up. She's got a pitcher and she knows where you sleep.
Opal: That's enough. She's got a job, you got a tab, and I know which one of you is easier to replace.
My ears rang and my hands stayed steady. Both things at once.
I poured their coffee slow and made them wait for it. Small thing. It felt like a hand I could hold onto.
Closing came and the chairs went up. Riggs sat at the club table with Tuck, coffee gone cold, and he didn't bother lowering his voice.
Riggs: She sleeps over a laundry. Hides her car under a tarp. Don't flinch when a man takes hold of her.
Tuck: So?
Riggs: So that's a woman who's been hit. A lot.
He said it out loud. In front of Opal. In front of Greta. Like I was a thing he'd added up and passed around the table.
Dahlia: You got more, or is that the whole show?
Dahlia: I've been hit. It didn't teach me to flinch. It taught me to swing.
Dahlia: You want to talk about me like I ain't in the room, say it to my face. I'm right here.
The whole room waited. Riggs looked at me a long time and didn't rush it.
Riggs: Fair enough.
No give in it. It still landed on me like respect, and I didn't know what to do with that.
Opal: Riggs. My floor.
Greta: Come on. I'll walk you out.
Greta squeezed my arm at the door and went back in. Riggs was out by his truck like he'd been waiting on me to finish.
Riggs: Get in. I'll drive you up.
Dahlia: No.
Riggs: It's thirty feet.
Dahlia: Then I'll walk thirty feet.
Riggs: I never offered you a ride.
Dahlia: The hell you didn't.
I stopped dead with my keys biting into my palm and my heart going like a rabbit's.
Riggs: I said get in. I got a question. I don't need a passenger for it.
Dahlia: Then ask it from there.
Riggs: What did Curtis say when he had hold of your wrist?
Dahlia: He said I was soft.
Something moved behind his face and got locked down before I could name it.
Riggs: Lock your door. Twice.
I walked up those stairs feeling his eyes on my back the whole way, and God help me, some ugly part of me liked it.